A Father’s Reflection

I have a quick reflection about fatherhood and love that I’ve been meaning to write about for awhile. As a father one of the biggest things I learned about parenthood from my dad was to love and sacrifice. For different people those things manifest in an infinite number of ways.

As Tene became more and more visibly pregnant with Akemi, I would often look down at our older son Kamau as I was putting him to sleep and wonder (as many parents have before me) how I could possibly love another child as much as I love Kamau. It wasn’t so much of a fear or nervousness, but a genuine curiosity I had about life and love. Shortly after Akemi was born my question was answered. What Akemi’s birth quickly taught me about our capacity to love is this:

Love isn’t something that we as humans, have a finite capacity to give or feel. That there isn’t one cup of love that we have to distribute and ration out for fear that our cup might run dry.

What Akemi’s birth taught me was that when we open our hearts, minds, and spirits to want to love, magically another cup appears for us to give from, and that as long as you want to love, your possibilities to do so are infinite.

Over the past year as our family has gotten more involved with myFace, one of the connections I’ve made to what was written above is realizing that we can support myFace and other similar organizations, or just people in general by opening up ourselves to love and thus giving. For some that may mean providing and sharing your time. For others it means sharing your experiences and moral support. Yet for others this may mean giving money. It is our capacity to love and give that drives the positive change we see in the world. So whether or not it’s specifically giving to myFace, nurture and explore your capacity to love.